


Maybe, I'm Afraid

by Wordy_Birdy (SocksAndSandals)



Category: Percy Jackson and the Olympians & Related Fandoms - All Media Types, Percy Jackson and the Olympians - Rick Riordan
Genre: Alternate Universe - Bodyguard, Alternate Universe - Royalty, Grief/Mourning, Guns, Hurt/Comfort, I take enormous liberties translating greek gods into a less incestuous modern family, M/M, Modern Royalty, Mortal Gods with Mortal Names, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Violence
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-07-27
Updated: 2020-07-28
Packaged: 2021-03-06 06:33:52
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,026
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25558900
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SocksAndSandals/pseuds/Wordy_Birdy
Summary: Nico di Angelo isn't expecting much out of a quiet day working in an ice cream parlor. And then a stranger claiming to be his uncle waltzes in out of the rain and turns everything he knows about his life on it's head. He's handed a difficult choice that could whisk him away from his quiet life in New York City, or leave a small monarchical island country in the Mediterranean with a murderer on the throne. He feels like he's been dumped into a fairy tale, except this one wants to kill him.Percy Jackson is a bodyguard working for a private protection agency run by Chiron Brunner, a man who gave his life purpose again. With a guilty conscience and too many ghosts clinging to his shoulders, he accepts a case that he never could have turned down in the first place. In his eyes, it's a chance at redemption, a chance to fix the mistakes he made with a boy he hasn't seen since high school. But first, he'll need to convince his new charge to trust him again, and fast, or he risks gaining another ghost.[Modern Royalty/Bodyguard au]
Relationships: Annabeth Chase & Percy Jackson & Grover Underwood, Annabeth Chase/Percy Jackson (Past), Nico di Angelo & Reyna Avila Ramírez-Arellano, Nico di Angelo/Percy Jackson, Percy Jackson & Grover Underwood
Comments: 5
Kudos: 18





	Maybe, I'm Afraid

**Author's Note:**

> Title taken from the song "maybe, i'm afraid" by lovelytheband.

“Here’s your change,” Nico intones, passing a small handful of cash and coins over the counter to the customer. As she turns to leave, he glances briefly over the small shop. There’s a couple teenagers near the front window, a young father with his son in a booth on the wall near the bathroom hallway, and another young woman sitting at one of the umbrellaed tables just outside. 

Everything is quiet, so he leans his hip against where the counter right-angles next to the cash register, looking down at the phone he has hidden behind said register. He doesn’t think there’ll be any new customers for a while. It’s been slow; not too many people coming in for ice cream when it’s been raining on and off all day.

He’s just started typing out a text to his sister in regard to her question about dinner and when he’ll be home, when a ten dollar bill settles on top of his phone. He looks up to see Reyna with one of the little styrofoam bowls reaching into the freezer display. He wordlessly rings her up for the bowl size and hands her the change as she comes to stand next to him with a spoonful of pistachio gelato sliding into her mouth.

No makeup, and she’s in sweats and a tank top today. He assumes it was a rough morning and that work is the only thing she’s got planned for today. She’s not the type to go back home before all the day’s tasks are done, and she’s certainly not dressed for anywhere other than the ice cream parlor or maybe a grocery store. And Reyna always does her shopping on Thursdays.

“Where’s mine?” Nico asks, returning to his texting. Reyna just gives him a look, that he sees from the corner of his eye, and he snorts. “Yeah I’m surprised you’re not sick of the stuff too yet.”

“I’m splurging,” Reyna supplies, and eats another spoonful. “Also gelato is just really good. It’s soft, and it’s sweet, and-”

“What happened?” Nico interrupts, glancing over at her knowingly. Reyna pouts for barely a moment before the expression disappears from her face and she stares down into her bowl of ice cream.

“Hylla,” she sighs, and Nico instantly has to bite back a groan and forces the scowl off his face. He’s gotten reprimanded more than a couple times about customers complaining that he’s always glaring.

“Is she impromptu crashing at your place _again?"_ Nico asks, turning more towards Reyna now as his friend picks at her ice cream methodically instead of answering. “Reyna when are you going to learn to put your foot down?”

“I can’t, Nico, she’s my sister,” Reyna says around the spoon in her mouth. “I know we don’t always get along like we used to, but I can’t just kick her out. I love her. I won’t put her on the street.”

“Then tell her to grow up and figure out how to hold a job. She’s mooching off you because there aren’t consequences to doing it,” Nico stresses, pocketing his phone. “I know you think it’ll close the distance between you two and I know you let her get away with it because she’s family, but come on. You’re the one who taught me to grow a backbone.”

Reyna is quiet for a while, continuing to eat small bites of ice cream like it’s something to be polite about. Careful as always. Nico finishes his text conversation and gives a nod to that young father and his kid as they leave. He watches them open umbrellas and head off into the rainy world outside. The air smells like sugar and cold cream. Even the ozone and petrichor from outside doesn’t permeate it.

“It’s hard,” Reyna finally sighs, and Nico can only nod in quiet agreement. Family is, indeed, ridiculously hard. That’s something he and Reyna have in common, so he can relate. It’s never easy when all the family you have left is just one sister.

“Wanna catch a movie this weekend? Maybe come back to my place for dinner afterwards?” Nico offers. It’s an escape from Reyna’s tiny apartment and difficult sister. Plus, he knows her weaknesses. As she knows his.

“Oh god yes,” she says, exactly as Nico was expecting her to. She smiles gratefully, even as she reaches over to adjust the scrunchie in his hair, tightening it’s hold on Nico’s unruly curls. There wasn’t time this morning to braid it. “Please distract me with even more terrible taste in movies and your factually wonderful cooking.”

“My taste in movies is not that bad,” Nico argues, and all he gets is a look in return. The smiles he plasters on as the bell on the door jingles isn’t _entirely_ customer service.

It falls as soon as he sees who has entered the tiny little ice cream parlor. Anyone with clearly dyed blond hair and who wears sunglasses in the rain, is guaranteed to be an asshole. And this one is accompanied by two broad-shouldered men in dark suits and Nico swears he caught a glimpse of a gun holster under one of their jackets.

There’s also a limousine parked on the sidewalk in front of the shop. It’s attracting curious eyes. Those two teenagers seem particularly interested in it and the blond man with his bruisers.

If Reyna takes a step closer to him, Nico doesn’t fight it.

“What can we get you sir?” Reyna asks, painting on the polite smile that Nico dropped in his surprise. He turns his attention towards the cash register to put in whatever this rich asshole orders. He wants nothing to do whoever this is. Unfortunately, when the sunglasses are slid down to his nose so he can look over the brims, the stranger is looking directly at Nico. Even as he speaks to Reyna.

“I’m not here for ice cream, doll. I was told that this is where a certain Nico di Angelo works,” blondie says. He has brilliant blue eyes that have _got_ to be contacts. There’s no way that’s natural. Of course, Nico’s seen his fair share of truly genetic unnatural eye colors, but something about this guy reeks of falsehoods and acting.

“From who?” Reyna asks, her smile falling. Blondie leans his forearm on the counter and Nico has to force himself not to lean away from it.

“A concerned family member.”

Nico’s never seen this many red flags since the one time he encountered a swastika arm band on a city bus. These are mostly different kinds of red flags, but they’re alarming nonetheless and he wants to slip out the back and escape on his bike. Unfortunately, he can’t get his feet to move.

_"Who?"_ Reyna insists.

“Why, _me_ of course,” the stranger says, plucking his sunglasses from his face and hanging them from his already low v-neck collar. His skin is a tanned olive, like a Mediterranean celebrity. There’s a tattoo of a sun on his left pectoral, peeking out from under the shirt. “I keep tabs on all my family members. It’s sort of my job to keep look out although I’m not the usual messenger. I can provide proof if you need it darling.”

“The only family I have is my half-sister.” Nico says, almost too quiet for himself to hear. It still gains the stranger’s attention, and Nico lifts his voice a little louder as he continues. “So who the hell are you?”

“Your uncle. I know we’ve never really met – last time I saw you and your sister you were barely a couple feet tall. I’m not surprised you don’t recognize me, even if it hurts a little bit,” the man says, placing a hand on his chest like he’s wounded. And then he snaps his fingers twice at one of his lackeys. The bruiser in question pulls an envelope out of the inside pocket of his jacket and hands it to Nico’s supposed uncle, who slides it across the counter to Nico like it’s full of cash or trade secrets.

He doesn’t want to touch it, but when Reyna reaches for it one of the bruisers steps forwards and puts a hand over it.

“Ah ah ah, not for you, sweetheart,” Uncle Blondie sings, wagging a finger at Reyna.

“She has a name,” Nico snaps as he tugs the envelope out from under the man’s hand.

“Alas, I do not know it. Though if I did I’d surely start waxing poetic.”

Nico exchanges a look with Reyna, and quietly agrees to _not_ actually tell blondie Reyna’s name or point out that her last name is scrawled on her apron in purple thread. Especially considering he still hasn’t told them his.

Nico feels like he’s gonna hurl, anxiety curling into a tight knot behind his solar plexus, but he opens the envelope regardless. What he pulls out, is a collection of photos. At first he’s confused. He doesn’t recognize the second man in the first photo. The first man – grinning wide with an arm thrown around the other man’s shoulders – is clearly the stranger in front of Nico claiming to be his uncle. The second has salt and pepper hair, dark eyes that seem to follow Nico as he tilts the photo closer to his face, and a stern frown.

He flips to the next photo, and his heart cuts in two. One half flies up into his throat, and the other drops into his stomach. There, smiling gently up at him in full color and cradling a pudgy baby in her arms, is Nico’s mother. He only recognizes it because he’s got this same photo, or at least half of it, stashed away in a box of baby things covered in Nico’s name. Standing next to his mother in the photo, with his hands on her waist, is that same salt-and-pepper man from the first photo. On his mother’s other side, is Bianca.

“What did you say your name was?” Nico hears himself say, distantly. Reyna is looking at him. He can feel her eyes on his skin. He still can’t quite breathe. Can’t look away from these faces he hasn’t seen in a lifetime.

“Cyrus di Angelo. I’m your father’s younger brother.”

“My father.” Nico says, tonelessly. “I’ve never met the man.”

“Well, good news! He wants to reconnect,” Cyrus grins. Reyna is gratefully staying silent now. Nico stares at the man in the photo, holding his mother, _smiling_ at her, at the baby in her arms that is without a doubt, Nico himself. He seems so different from the stern face in the other photo, but those dark eyes are the same. And the more he stares, the more he realizes they are also Bianca’s eyes.

“Why?” he asks, finally tearing his eyes away from the pictures.

“Now ain’t that a question. Unfortunately, it’s not one I can really answer in public, and you’ll probably want to be sitting down when you hear it. Plus, your daddy-o wanted to tell you himself. I’m just here to give you a place and time,” Cyrus shrugs, snapping his fingers again. Another envelope is deposited on the counter. This one is sealed with real black wax pressed into the shape of some family crest. Nico’s family crest? Does he have a family crest? “Don’t open it here. Wait until you’re somewhere private and secure. Can’t risk any nasty business right now. Oh and here’s my card. Call me sometime! We are family, after all.”

A business card is flicked onto the table, Cyrus gives them both a wink that Nico is fairly sure is mostly directed at Reyna, and then all three men leave the shop. There’s a few minutes of absolute silence, with the few occupants of the shop all staring at Nico and Reyna or the door and the limo that’s pulling away from the curb. And then Reyna sets a hand on the counter next to Nico and leans into his field of vision.

“Are you okay?”

“I… I think I need to sit down,” Nico admits, looking back down at the photos in his hand. Reyna nods towards the back of the shop. He gives her a grateful look, and then slips into the back room and collapses into a chair at the single round table they have for breaks. He puts down the letter and the photos and then leans his elbows on the table and drops his face into his hands.

His chest aches, but other than that it’s almost impossible to truly determine what he’s feeling. His head is a swirling storm and is starting to ache just as much as his chest. He has a father. He knows his father’s face now. He has an uncle. He has family. Family that waited until he was twenty three to show themselves. So why now? Why did they not announce themselves when he was clawing his way through college? Why not when he was in high school and hating everything he discovered about himself? Why not years ago when Bianca…

But those aren’t questions he can answer by himself. His father, though. Nico picks up the letter and turns it around in his fingers. His name – his full name – is written in neat cursive handwriting on the front. With a black ink stamp of the same family crest that adorns the wax on the back of the letter. There’s nothing else. Nothing to help him determine the purpose for the letter. Supposedly, the time and date that Cyrus said he was here to deliver, but there had to be more than that to warrant writing out a whole fancy letter like this.

Still, he couldn’t open it here. Both because of what Cyrus said about being somewhere private and secure, and also because he’s terrified the contents will be too distracting to safely drive home. So he sets it back down and glances again at the photos. There’s a couple more than just the two Nico looked at, but he doesn’t want to look at the other ones. The two he’d seen had done more than enough damage.

He slides them back into their envelope carefully and takes both envelopes over to where his jacket hangs by the lockers. Once they’re safely tucked away inside the inner pocket of his jacket, he leans back against the lockers and takes a couple deep breaths. He needs to get back to work, and besides, there’s nothing he can do about it right now. So he breathes, and he compartmentalizes, and then he heads back out to return to his shift.

\---

“We have an uncle?” Hazel asks, after Nico finishes telling her what happened at the ice cream parlor. He’s sitting on their couch with the letter in his hands, the envelope of photos unopened on the table. “Are we sure we believe him?”

“Take a look at the pictures yourself if you want,” Nico says, waving a hand towards the envelope in question as he twists sideways and falls back into the cushion against the arm of the couch. Hazel tosses aside the drying rag from doing the dishes and comes over to pick up the envelope. As she sits down on the other end of the couch, Nico moves his feet and props them up on the back instead. He toes his boots off and lets them fall to the floor behind the couch.

He keeps his eyes on the letter in his hands, still unopened, as Hazel pages through the photos. She looks at more than just the first two, but Nico says nothing. And Hazel says nothing.

“Is that… our dad?” She asks, turning the photos towards Nico. He glances over at them just long enough to register which one she has in her hands – the family photo that squeezes Nico’s chest again – and then looks away.

“Yeah. Tall, dark, and imposing,” Nico confirms, and flips the letter over in his hands to stare at the wax on the back. He’s still terrified of breaking it and seeing what’s inside.

He and Hazel have lived together for as long as Nico can remember, really. There’s not much he can recall from before he was ten. Just blurry fragments and a lot of pain, so he generally avoids trying to. He and Bianca attended a boarding school, and spent summers – just summers – with Hazel and her mother. Marie Levesque had graciously put up with it. It had only lasted until he was fifteen, and his world shattered again, and he moved in with them full time to attend a normal public high school. It helped, somewhat.

Hazel and Nico had gotten a place together for college, and there they’d been for the past few years, even though both of them graduated a couple years ago. Neither of them ever knew their shared father, just that they’re half-siblings.

“Do we know his name?” Hazel asks. Nico shakes his head. “Did Cyrus say anything about him wanting to meet me too?”

“No, but I’ll bring you with me if you want,” he offers.

“So you’re actually going to meet him? Hear what he wants to say?”

“Yeah, I think so. But he’s going to hear what I have to say too,” he decides, and cracks the seal on that letter. Hazel sets the photos back in their envelope on the coffee table and turns towards him, crisscrossing her legs on the cushions.

“What’s it say?”

“To Nicola Vito di Angelo,” he reads out loud. Hazel snorts, and pulls a brief smile out of Nico. “Off to a good start, right? Using my whole ass name. Anyways. To me. I know it has been a very long time since we’ve exchanged words or even seen each other-”

“Yeah no kidding,” Hazel interrupts.

“-So I imagine this correspondence will be a bit of a surprise, especially considering who I am sending to deliver it,” Nico continues. “Please feel free to speak your mind to dear Cyrus. Or step on his toes. Although as little brothers go, I suppose he could be worse. But I digress. The main purpose of this letter is to let you know that I am in New York and would appreciate it if you joined me for dinner this coming Sunday. Or perhaps any day, if you aren’t free then.”

“God, he sounds so awkward,” Hazel snorts, twisting forwards again to flop back into the couch. She hugs one of the pillows, her fingers in the fabric giving away her own less-than-happy feelings about this. Nico doesn’t blame her. It’s difficult to read. His father is trying so hard to be casual, if also stiffly formal at the same time, and the disconnect in the words alone is palpable enough that Nico can taste it.

“I’ve included a time and place at the bottom of the page. If there is a need to change it, my secretary’s number has also been included. I would give you my own, but I feel it’s important to save any words for when we reunite in person. And I fear hearing-” Nico cuts off as his eyes roll over the next few words, an uncomfortable lump forming in his throat. Hazel looks over at him, and he forces himself to continue. “I fear hearing your voice would cause me to lose my own. The distance has been painful for both of us, I’m sure. I have missed you dearly, Nicola. Your father, Plutone Otello di Angelo.”

“Plutone?” Hazel asks. Nico rolls the name over in his head until something from his Classics class comes back to him.

“No, I think it’s pronounced plu-Toh-nae. It’s the Italian form of Pluto,” he corrects, and then goes quiet as he rereads the letter to himself, including the time and place at the bottom of the page as well as the labeled phone number. His secretary is some guy named Kal Mors.

He checks his work schedule on his phone, and then dials the number. Hazel watches him wordlessly as he puts it on speaker and motions for her to be quiet.

_“Hello you’ve reached Kal Mors, personal assistant to Sir Plutone di Angelo, how can I help you?”_ a voice says as the call connects. A very deep voice. Hazel’s eyes go a little wider.

“This is Nicola di Angelo, I was informed that I should contact you in regard to my meeting with… uh, my. Father,” Nico says, halting for a moment to figure out what exactly he wants to call this Plutone di Angelo. He hates phone calls in general but this one is already particularly horrible.

_“Ah! Of course, of course, I was not expecting you to call so soon. As far as I have been informed, Cyrus only just went to deliver the letter today,”_ Mr. Mors says.

“He did. I didn’t need too long to decide,” he says. And then, before the secretary can say anything more, “Sunday works. I’ll be there at the time my father arranged. Do I need to like, dress up or anything? The place sounds pretty fancy.”

_“Well, knowing your father’s tastes, I would advise that you wear at least business casual,”_ Kal answers, sounding methodical. _“However, as Plutone’s friend, sometimes it is best to be blunt regardless of how it makes him feel. So please just come as yourself. He needs to see you for who you are. And thank you for calling to confirm the arrangement, I’ll be sure to let him know.”_

“No problem,” Nico says, and then he hangs up without another word. “Blunt, huh? Oh I’ll be blunt. Blunt enough to leave a bruise.”

“Will you really bring me with you?” Hazel asks quietly, cutting through Nico’s glowering mood. He pulls his feet down and slides over the couch to take Hazel’s hand in his and squeeze gently.

“You deserve a chance to meet him too,” he says, and leans in to kiss her forehead. She smiles sweetly, and then lets Nico flop back down and go back to staring at that letter. She pulls his feet up into her lap and leans her head back into the couch.

“I do, don’t I?”

“Yeah, you do. And personally, I would love an explanation as to why he cheated on my mom with yours,” he says, his eyes rereading the letter again. And then again. He has a father. He has a father that wants to meet him. Reconnect. He has an uncle. Was there more? Did his father have other siblings? He apparently had friends in the form of secretaries. Did Nico have cousins? Grandparents? Where had they all been his whole life?

“Considering Mom ain’t said anything about it either, yeah, me too,” Hazel sighs. “I always thought she hated whoever our dad was and that’s why she didn’t want to tell me. And she didn’t really like you growing up, only kinda put up with it but I wanna know _why_. Is this Plutone guy really that bad?”

“I guess we’re gonna find out,” Nico says, and then gently folds the letter back into it’s envelope and tosses it back onto the coffee table. “Sunday. But until then, I am determined to not let this take over my head. God knows I’ll end up spiraling or something trying to overthink it.”

“Wanna help me make dinner?”

“What were you thinking of?”

“Maybe some po boys. We’ve got some leftover fried shrimp in the freezer from last week,” Hazel says, sliding off the couch and dropping the pillow back onto it. “Do we have veggies?”

“Just went shopping yesterday so we should be stocked,” Nico says, hopping up to follow her into the kitchen. “You’re in charge, queen, just tell me what to do.”

He gets a pinched cheek for that, but it makes them both smile. And for now the envelopes on the coffee table are forgotten. Lost in the process of making food and conversation about lighter things. Reyna’s troubles with her sister, their weekend plans, Hazel going out to catch her own movie with Leo and Piper, Nico’s tragic taste in movies.

**Author's Note:**

> Just in case you didn't catch it, Cyrus di Angelo is Apollo. There will be, many mortal versions of gods in this, and because they're mortal they're going to have Slightly different personalities than they do in canon. 
> 
> This isn't meant to get longer than like 15 chapters at most, and is an effort to practice writing short stories so I'm really trying to dedicate myself to seeing it through to the end. Roughly 3 chapters are written already but this is the only one thus far that's been edited and beta read. I know better than to try and hold myself to an update schedule (I Will break it), but I'll try to get the next chapter finished and polished relatively soon.


End file.
